Shadows of Sepia

As I descend
into meandering dreams,
out of the corner
of sleep-swept eyes,
I see the slender hands of Time
reaching out to stroke the midnight air
calmly putting to rest
and releasing her grasp
on the remnants of the day.
And as the Day floats up
to begin it’s journey
a tiny tear of regret escapes
the metameric shell of my dreams
caressing un-noticed, curving its way
gently down my sleeping cheek.

Discarded Days take flight
and pass through gnarled limbs
of ancient Live Oaks where the irony
falls upon deaf ears and muted lips
of yesterday’s apparitions,
tethered to decadent marble pediments
beneath sacrilegious pillars
of every imagined could have been.

And for awhile they will reside
along with a legion of heckling ravens
secreted away in cosmic courtyards
gleefully trilling reminders
of rendezvoused paths recklessly trodden
and those not taken.
Slumbering dreamless
into dusty bits of tattered memories
before their colors begin
to bleed themselves down
like falling shadows of sepia-colored regret
floating just beyond the reach
of desperately clawing memories
and my outstretched fingertips.

© Copyright claimed 2007, Debra Marlar